Postmortem Studies of Humans
•1988 Buhl and Bojsen-Moller – 100 patients (consecutive autopsies)
• schizophrenia 35% Alz. pathology
• non-psych controls 0%   Alz. pathology
•
•
1989 Soustek – 225 pts with chronic schizophrenia (dying in 1975-85)
• 41% showed Alz. pathology
• 6x higher rate than general population
•
•1994 Wisniewski – 102 patients with history of schizophrenia
–41 died prior to antipsychotic era 46% had tangles
–62 died after antipsychotic era 74% had tangles
–     
Historically, pathologists have devised a variety of chemical methods for preserving and examining brain tissue.   Accompanying these changes have been several revisions in the classification schemes (thresholds) used to decide if a specimen demonstrates “probable” vs. “definite” signs of
Alzheimer’s disease.

In light of the complexity of these revisions, there is a compelling record in the  medical literature which suggests a positive association between antipsychotic drugs and the appearance of Alzheimer’s pathology within the human brain.